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The eccentric Dermody turns up again, now a smart young ensign, having temporarily forsaken letters, and obtained a commission through the interest of Lord Moira. He addresses a flattering poem to Sydney, and passes on to rejoin his regiment at Cork, whence he is to sail for Flanders. Mr. Owenson's affairs did not improve.

Dermody, the bailiff, possessed relatives in London, of whom he occasionally spoke, and relatives in Scotland, whom he never mentioned. My father had a strong prejudice against the Scotch nation. Dermody knew his master well enough to be aware that the prejudice might extend to him, if he spoke of his Scotch kindred. He was a discreet man, and he never mentioned them.

He had observed that Dermody, too, presumed to be amused. He seemed to become mad with anger, all in a moment. "I have been told of this infernal tomfoolery," he said, "but I didn't believe it till now. Who has turned the boy's weak head? Who has encouraged him to stand there hugging that girl? If it's you, Dermody, it shall be the worst day's work you ever did in your life."

For the rest, the waters of oblivion had closed over the old golden days at Greenwater Broad. WHEN YOU last saw me, I was a boy of thirteen. You now see me a man of twenty-three. The story of my life, in the interval between these two ages, is a story that can be soon told. Speaking of my father first, I have to record that the end of his career did indeed come as Dame Dermody had foretold it.

"I promised Miss Dunross to take the green flag with me, wherever I might go." My mother smiled. "Is it possible, George, that you think about this as the young lady in Shetland thinks? After all the years that have passed, you believe in the green flag being the means of bringing Mary Dermody and yourself together again?" "Certainly not! I am only humoring one of the fancies of poor Miss Dunross.

A lovely, angelic brightness flowed like light from heaven over her face. For one moment she stood enraptured. The next she clasped me passionately to her bosom, and whispered in my ear: "I am Mary Dermody! I made it for You!" The shock of discovery, following so closely on all that I had suffered before it, was too much for me. I sank, fainting, in her arms.

A poor scholar, the son of a drunken country schoolmaster, who turned him adrift at fourteen, Dermody had wandered up to Dublin, paying his way by reciting poetry and telling stories to his humble entertainers, with a few tattered books, one shirt, and two shillings for all his worldly goods.

"I shall count three slowly," he resumed. "Before I get to the last number, make up your mind to do what I tell you, or submit to the disgrace of being taken away by force." "Take him where you may," said Dame Dermody, "he will still be on his way to his marriage with my grandchild." "And where shall I be, if you please?" asked my father, stung into speaking to her this time.

Those under forty-one years of age were retaken later by the Government under its new powers of conscription, but the Battalion saw few of them more. These men W. Jones, Mort, Woods, Stanton, Fielding, Lyth, Bracken, Houghton, Dermody, Parkinson, Barber were the salt of the Regiment. During the long years when Territorial service had been irksome and unfashionable, they made it succeed.

A second test having been followed by equally satisfactory results, it was decided that a sum of money should be raised by subscriptions, and that Dermody should be assisted to enter the university. Owenson, with his wife's cordial consent, took the young poet into his house, and treated him like his own son.